Luke 23:54-56
It was the day of Preparation, and the sabbath was beginning. The women who had come with him from Galilee followed, and they saw the tomb and how his body was laid. Then they returned, and prepared spices and ointments.
On the sabbath they rested according to the commandment.
The cross is empty
The tomb is filled
And the women
knowing that their world has changed
try to busy themselves
Preparing spices
Observing sabbath
Bearing their grief together
Waiting - for what?
Their future looks as bleak as ours
who keep vigil today
on this Saturday that we call Holy
As we witness our world becoming all the more dangerous
for all who have been othered.
When government announcements seem incredible
in their blindness
and in their coldness
and in their bone-shaking cruelty
When we can’t see a way
of moving from the despair that grips us
When we fear that we have no agency for change
what are the spices
and the ointments
that we might prepare
to subvert the forces of evil?
How will we use this tomb time?
In fear and hiding?
Or in resting while gathering resolve?
The evil that confronts us
will not be defeated by force and by noise and chatter
not even by well meaning pronouncements
but by small, seemingly insignificant, acts of resistance
Acts of love and compassion
of inclusion and embrace
Radical hospitality practiced fiercely and relentlessly
promoted subversively
until dawn emerges from the darkness
and light transforms the world.
So, gathering all our reserves
to vanquish darkness today
let us make this tomb time count.
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